Despite its higher opus number, the String Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Op. 13, was composed almost exactly two years before the String Quartet No. 1 in E flat major, Op. 12. Although it was completed on October 26, 1827, the A minor Quartet was not published until 1830, a year after the Quartet in E flat.

In the introduction to the first movement is a quote from Mendelssohn's song Ist es wahr?, the first line of which is "Is it true you are waiting for me in the arbor by the vine-clad wall?" Because of this, some writers have suggested the piece derives from Mendelssohn's emotions concerning a youthful love affair. A much more powerful and significant presence in the quartet, however, is that of Beethoven. After the introduction, the first movement bursts into a passionate sonata-form structure in which the material is treated in counterpoint. A dissonant transition leads to a secondary theme, group, made up of three themes. The development section is frantic, and after the recapitulation, there is more development in the coda.

The pensive slow movement is marked Adagio non lento. The Ist es wahr figure from the first movement appears in the first section, as does a quote from the Cavatina of Beethoven's String Quartet, Op. 130. Its central, fugal segment is clearly a reference to the fugue in the middle of the slow movement of Beethoven's Quartet in F major, Op. 95. Not only are the subjects very similar, but the fugue in both cases begins in the viola and is answered by the second violin. As in the Beethoven, the fugal material alternates with the beginning of the movement, but in the Mendelssohn the two sections are less disparate and come together at the end.

Of the four movements in the Op. 13 quartet, the third, an Intermezzo, is the least indebted to Beethoven. It has a more lyrical sound than many of Mendelssohn's scherzos, and the contrasting central section is filled with youthful liveliness.

Mendelssohn's "recitative" introduction to the Finale is a blatant imitation of the same procedure in Beethoven's String Quartet in A major, Op. 132, where it gives way, attacca, to the ensuing Allegro finale. Mendelssohn's recitative even includes detached chords like those in Beethoven's. The development section contains reminiscences of the recitative introduction and the fugue of the second movement, which returns yet again in the coda. Mendelssohn brings the listener full circle by closing with a reprise of the Adagio introduction to the first movement, stretching the melody of Ist es wahr. Here, the first violin makes a continuous line from reminiscences of the introduction to the main theme of the finale, the second-movement fugue and the main motive of the first movement, unifying the entire piece and making clear the relationships between the themes.

© All Music Guide

Portions of Content Provided by All Music Guide.
© 2008 All Media Guide, LLC. All Music Guide is a registered trademark of All Media Guide, LLC.